This workshop will take place during the 13th Annual IMISCOE Conference that takes place in Prague from 30 June to 2 July 2016. In it we further develop on the crucial dynamic of representations of “the other” in the media, the public sphere and new forms of politics.
The current economic and financial crisis has been replaced by the so-called refugee-crisis. Although it can be discussed who has the crisis, the refugees, the countries in conflict or Europe itself the crisis thus re-articulates and strengthens distinctions between wanted/unwanted, deserving and undeserving groups and subsequently also revisits positions in relation to recognition and redistribution discourses, politics and positions. While ethnic and demographic diversification is welcomed by some, there is a growing concern about the effects of immigration on the economy and on welfare.
These positions often translate into a demand for political response and action targeting asylum-seeker and refugees and in general the number of migrants entering the country. Within this context xenophobic sentiments show different and more dangerous faces. Increasingly harsh immigration restrictions, regulations and exclusionary practices are today not only advocated by radical and populist right wing parties but everyday practice in all part of Europe. Striving for control and seeking to appease popular resentment, European governments and elites have tried to limit both the access to the nation-states and to the welfare benefits by introducing or strengthening hierarchies of stratifications between groups deemed to be entitled/deserving in opposition to those not-entitled and undeserving. As consequence, European countries have engaged in a “race to the bottom” in order to limit the number of asylum seekers in their “own” countries and instead hoping that someone else would take the responsibility. Considering these recent events, the basic distinction between radicalism and extremism has been revisited and triggered questions about what counts as mainstream, and what does not.
We welcome papers from a wide range of disciplines, covering one or all the aspects of public opinion, media representations of “the other”, party political dynamics and/or papers that engage with the crucial distinction between radicalism and extremism.
Please, send your abstract (approximately 250 words) to the organizers at